To cartoon junkies of a certain age, "Rocky & Bullwinkle & Friends" is a cherished childhood memory. For Tiffany Ward, the show literally was a part of her childhood.

As the daughter of "R&B" producer Jay Ward (who died in 1989), Tiffany visited her father's studios and sometimes heard scripts enacted live. With the first-ever release of the complete series on home video, the UCLA grad and president of Ward Productions reflected on growing up with "R&B."

Q. What was it like growing up in the Ward household? Was it normal? Was it manic?

A. Kind of somewhere in between. It wasn't normal, it wasn't manic — it was eccentric. My father had a great sense humor, but he was very strict. He would be strict about what colors you wore, your manners. I'm the middle of two brothers. He didn't think girls should do a lot of things. He and the sons golfed, but he thought that girls shouldn't play golf, and they shouldn't wear red, and they shouldn't go out alone (laughs).

Q. Watching the show as a child, did you understand the topical humor that was in "Rocky and Bullwinkle," or did it go over your head?

A. Well, we were not allowed to watch other cartoons in our family. That was considered heresy (laughs). I'm sure I didn't get all the different levels of the show. But my dad always said that he wrote the cartoons for adults, not children. The really young kids — let's say, under 7 — would just get all of the great voices and the animated characters. The middle kids would be trying to figure out why the adults were all laughing.

Q. Did you get to tour the studio? Did you witness any of the recording or animating?

A. Well, he produced the shows out of three separate buildings on Sunset (Boulevard). They were about five blocks from our house. We were there, sometimes, on the weekends. A lot of the animation was done in Mexico, but a lot of writers were here. I went to the recording sessions at night in the sound studio. My dad would always be directing (voice actors) June Foray, Bill Scott, of course, Paul Frees and Edward Everett Horton.

Q. Would the actors record their material separately? Would the individual performances be edited together later?

A. Back then, they were all in one recording studio together. It was a fascinating thing to watch. Nowadays, everybody does their thing whenever, and they splice it all together. But in those days, they all did it together. So you had this group of incredibly talented people who really liked each other. They just had camaraderie.

Q. Do you remember witnessing a recording session, and then seeing the finished product on television later on?

A. Well, I went to a lot of them. My favorite one was a "Fractured Fairy Tale." It was a rip-off of Disney's "Snow White." I was there when it was recorded, so when it was broadcast months later, it was like, "Wow, I was there for that!" It was kind of surreal.

Q. Alex Anderson Jr. (who sued the Ward estate and won court-ordered recognition as the creator of Rocky and Bullwinkle) isn't mentioned in the book. He passed away in October. How does the family remember him?

A. It's a very odd situation. They were friends since the age of 5, my dad and Alex. They did "Crusader Rabbit" together. Years later, Dad wanted to continue in animation, but Alex didn't want to. He had a great job in advertising in San Francisco. Years later, Alex wanted to leave San Francisco and move to Carmel. He wrote pilots for my dad. So he worked for my dad again later on. In fact, Alex gave one of the eulogies at my dad's funeral. And then a year and a half later, he turned around and sued us. But he didn't have anything to do with "Rocky and Bullwinkle," ever.

Q. Was your father ever aware that "Rocky & Bullwinkle" was being watched by adults and college students as well as young children?

A. I would say he was always aware of that. As I said, my father was very adamant that the show was for adults. I didn't comprehend how big of an impact it had until I went to college years later. I met all these students who were still fans of the show. They said, "You're Jay Ward's daughter?" I was amazed that they knew my dad's name! They knew who he was. I thought it was quite odd.